An Empty Win

by Aponypocalypse

Rating: everyone
Tags: Slice of Life, Sad
Length: 5134

Rainbow Dash learns a lesson in victory

Since she was a filly, Rainbow Dash has always been obsessed with idea of victory, going to no ends of means to achieve it. However, one day, she meets with a decision, one that teaches her a lesson in the ways of friendship, of fighting, and of defeat.

Published 1970-01-01 00:00:00 UTC
Last updated 2014-03-02 08:00:04 UTC

An Empty Win

The blue pegasus flew hitherto against the gusting winds, seething in the passing glory of the moment. Her hooves touching the air rushing past her, she inhaled once, and shot forwards in a frenzied ray of prismatic colour, circling twice around numerous clouds before catapulting herself into the high atmosphere. She glanced around, perhaps unnoticeably, for every one of actions were being conducted at light-speed, and blasted down, the heat gathering in tiny rivulets, then streaks, then enveloping her figure as she drilled through the sky, the friction burning hotly against her skin…

“Rainbow Dash!”

The call of her name had caused the pegasus to turn momentarily, drifting her off-course and subsequently sent her spiraling uncontrollably towards the earth. She yelped, trying to regain control, but only half succeeding, resulting in a blunted, somewhat awkward landing that flung her back hoof crunching onto the ground first before the rest of her body.

The caller, on the other hand, was looking extremely anxious. “O-oh my!” The yellow pegasus exclaimed. “Rainbow Dash, are you alright?”

The blue pegasus grunted, and got up. Her legs and face were aching, as they would have after being plunged into solid ground, but besides that she could feel no other injury. Just to check, she gave the hindleg that crashed first a thorough stretch. Nope, no pain. She felt a momentary lapse of relief, but soon a bubbling, rising anger came to replace it. Gritting her teeth, she turned to the pony who had interrupted her and asked, “I’m fine. What is it?”

The yellow pegasus skittered nervously. “Oh, I’m really, really sorry for disturbing your flight practice, and I really, really want to make it up to you some day, but right now, I have this problem, and, oh, I’m so sorry for troubling you…”

“Out with it!” Rainbow Dash growled.

“Oh, um…” The yellow pegasus' hid her face behind a curtain of pink frocks. A soft squeak could be heard. “Well, it’s, um, my animals. They’ve become a little…ballistic.”

Rainbow Dash blinked, then dragged her hooves down her face and groaned. “Fluttershy! Don’t tell me your animals have been taking you up again!”

“No, no!” The yellow pegasus shook her head vigorously. “Nothing like that! They’ve only been misbehaving a bit, that’s all!”

“Fluttershy, this is the fifth time this week they’ve been misbehaving! It’s about time you consider putting them on a leash or something!” Rainbow Dash motioned to the sky in annoyance. “Besides, I’m practicing the Sonic Rainboom now, the most awesome move to have come from a Cloudsdale filly ever! I don’t have time to take care of your animals! Ugh, why do have to be so weak?”

“Oh.” The pink maned pony shrank back, as if she had just intruded upon a private scene. She whispered. “Oh, gosh then, I’m sorry. I won’t be any more trouble then, no, no, I won’t. I’ll just be leaving now, I’ll find someone else to help me with my problems…oh dear, I hope I wasn’t any trouble…”

Rainbow Dash watched as Fluttershy made her awkward exit backwards, and felt a twinge of guilt as she did. Should she go and apologise to her, for being so rude and refusing to help her with the animals? She was her friend, after all, and she didn’t mean any harm when she came to interrupt her flight practice. On the other hoof, though, she still had a radical move to perfect, and although she didn’t like to admit it, today was one of her braver days if she dared to attempt the Sonic Rainboom; an anomaly she had never managed to replicate since her younger years in flight camp. She sighed, bringing a hoof over her temples again. It was always too hard to decide when it came to these kinds of things, whether to take the company of a friend or give it up for the honour of the prize, a true dilemma it was, one that made her head hurt. Eventually, though, she seemed to make her decision, for she turned away, speeding off into the distance…

…and flung up, whirling her way into the inviting winds. “Yahoo! Yes!” The rainbow maned pegasus was screaming. “I just can’t believe this is happening!”

“So you keep telling us.” Replied a tightly uniformed, fiery maned pony. Had she been older and a little more experienced, Rainbow Dash might have detected the sarcasm and weariness that dragged at the seasoned flier’s every word, and pulled down at her eyelids darkly, so the guise of fatigue could mask the narrowed eyes that suggested that felt like she was wasting her time. On this occasion, though, Rainbow Dash was blissfully oblivious, prompting Spitfire to clear her throat and ask what their ‘esteemed champion’ wanted to do next.

“I don’t know, anything!” Rainbow Dash replied cheerily. “I’m just so happy to be with the bestest fliers team in Equestria! Can you believe that I was just crowned the Best Young Flier a few hours ago?”

“No, I can’t.” Spitfire replied curtly.

“I mean, winning it was good enough, it was radical to receive that trophy from Princess Celestia. But really did it was that I got to win a whole day out with the…Wonderbolts.” Rainbow Dash’s squealed momentarily. She turned to the captain with an exalted smile. “Did you know that I have all your figurines?”

“That sounds…wonderful.”

“It is, isn’t it?” Rainbow Dash squeaked again, and did a backflip. “Oh, I just can’t believe that I’m with the Wonderbolts! And it’s only slightly after noon, imagine that; I can’t wait to spend the rest of the day with you guys! ”

“Well, we hope that you’re enjoying yourself.” She clapped her hooves, rousing her various subordinates of similar uniforms and differing mane colours who had taken to nodding off drowsily atop several clouds, and awakening Soarin, who blew a snot bubble as he was shaken from his slumber. “Oi! Get yourselves together! Our champion wants to spend her time with us! We’re on for the training grounds after this, and I want you all at your peak condition when we reach there, is that clear?”

There was a tiny simmering of dissent at this order, before the pegasi marched dutifully into position affront Spitfire. Hollering orders, the group was just about to leave the vicinity when their leader spotted the blue pegasus staring blankly into space with a glazed look, as if she had just remembered something. Sighing, Spitfire screamed at her platoon to stop, and went to check on their guest.

“Hey, champ, what is it?”

“Oh.” Rainbow Dash blinked nervously, then bore a grin. “It’s nothing.”

“Okay.” Spitfire replied unamusedly. She turned to her troupe. “Let’s go!”

“No, wait!” The now-alarmed pegasus grabbed onto Spitfire’s hoof. When the sergeant retracted it coldly, Rainbow Dash near blushed, and said, “I just remembered, I have an appointment with my friends this afternoon at the spa. I can’t spend the day with you guys anymore.”

“Really?” Spitfire’s interest seemed suddenly piqued. She watched the pegasus alertly. “So are you going to go?”

“Well, normally I would, just for the heck of it, but today is my day with the Wonderbolts, and they all know how much I was looking forward to it…” Rainbow Dash’s head bobbed up suddenly, as if she had been struck by lightning. “But Rarity, I never got to talk with her! I need to be there with her; I need to tell her I forgive her...”

“Forgive her?” The sergeant raised an eyebrow.

“For the competition, for wearing those butterfly wings and showing off and stealing my limelight, I need to tell her I’m cool…” Rainbow Dash stopped, then changed direction abruptly. “I mean, I did tell her I was alright, after the competition, but everyone was cheering and shouting, so she probably couldn’t hear, and the way I was totally ignoring her yesterday when she made her apologies because I was so excited…no, I don’t think it’s enough.”

“Well, this sounds like a serious matter you need to resolve, you’ll probably have to leave at once.” Spitfire clapped her hooves once, and the troupe began to disband. She turned to shoot a mildly empathic expression at Rainbow Dash. “We very much regret that you weren’t be able to finish your day with us today, we enjoyed it a lot, but there’ll always be a chance next ye—"

“No, wait!” The pegasus clung onto Spitfire’s hoof, to another quick removal. “I really want to stay with you guys, I do! I’m just…not sure yet.”

The sergeant’s brows creased in an annoyed clinch. “Well, then, decide! Do you want to be spending your time watching us do our ‘awesome’ routine, or with your friends in a spa? Just choose, Celestia-forbid; it’s not like I’m interested either way.”

Rainbow Dash’s face drooped almost comedically. The world seemed to spin around her, and as it did, she caught the sights of the many Wonderbolts members, watching, unbeknownst to her, with hopeful expressions in their eyes. She rubbed her teeth, danced on her hooves, and darted her eyes around the area, as if searching for some sign to calm her frantic indecision. When none appeared, she shut her eyes and tried concentrating, her forehead convulsing beneath a sweat-sheened layer of skin.

Then, suddenly, she had calmed. She reopened her eyes, facing an indifferent looking Spitfire, and opened her furred muzzle to say…

“What am I going to do, what am I going to do, what am I going to do…?”

The rainbow pony now paced uneasily outside a sleekly decorated office room, muttering uncertain breaths to herself. She hopped, danced, skipped around, draped in a costume of distinctly blue and yellow bolts, as if she had just come from a circus, and pressed her brows together, her neck warming up from the pressure she was putting on herself.

“Alright one more time, from the top again, ahem, I’m sorry Miss Spitfire ma’am for this sudden intrusion, but…” Rainbow Dash stopped, suspended for a second, then slammed a hoof against her skull repeatedly. “No, no, no!”

This process had been part of a ten minute repetition, where with every failed recitation and physical self-punishment, mostly in the form of head torture, proved only to encourage the uncomfortable fluttering in her stomach even more, bringing the blue pony close to the edge of a spontaneous breakdown. Anxiously, Rainbow Dash repeated the words that seemed so far away and yet just at the edge of her tongue, but even then made no substantial progress up to the point where the sergeant’s door flew stylishly open, and she was invited to enter.

“Let’s see, Spitfire, I’m sorry for my imprudence, I believe there is a matter I need to discuss…” she had said, before noticing that the door had been swung open by none other than the Wonderbolts’ Captain herself. Rainbow Dash shut up immediately, and the fiery maned pony stared with eyes as soulless as frozen daggers. “What is it, Rainbow Dash?”

“I, um, uh…” Rainbow Dash came out as unconfidently as she might have ever feared, but quickly took her stand onto hard ground. “I’m here to talk about my friends. “ She affirmed. “The matter of what had happened in the cloudkicking test today.”

Spitfire raised an unempathetic eyebrow, with the slightest hint of being impressed. “Well, what’s there to talk about? You and your wingpony, Lighting Dust, was it, broke an Academy record today. You’ve got a done place in the Wonderbolts’ at this rate.”

“Well, we’re done.” The blue pony slammed a hoof down strongly.

“Done already?” Spitfire turned to her clock in feinted surprise. “Why, that’s a new Academy record!”

“She made a hurricane!” Protested the recruit.

“Yes, a bit excessive for a cloudkicking test.” She admitted. “But with the time you got it seems like that tactic proved effective, don’t you think?”

“I, um…” Rainbow Dash throttled her head vigorously. “I mean, no! That hurricane nearly took out my friends!”

“Hm, well, still, it was a pretty good run.” Spitfire put aside her shades and leaned back contentedly. “You really pushed yourself a lot today!”

“I…” Rainbow Dash hesitated for a second, as if wanting to hold back words that were already frothing out of her mouth. Eventually, though, she seemed to decide against it, for she began a long speech to Spitfire, the things practically leaping to her tongue as they had refused to leave her thoughts only a few minutes ago. Spitfire initially watched with disinterest, but as the seconds ticked by with no end in Dash’s talk, even she began to feel uncomfortable. Rainbow Dash spoke the words, sang them, recited them perfectly and clearly as if it was an address she had practiced a thousand times. And when she was done, completing her pronouncement with a strong-willed action that would have garnered the gasps from many of her fellow Academy hopefuls, there was a tensing of the air around them, a lingering disquiet that had not existed in the time that the clock had ticked to let Rainbow Dash in. Silently, ainboow Dash shuffled out of the office, and Spitfire sighed, contemplating how to word her apology to the impulsive recruit when she would inevitably have to confront her again later.

Not soon after, a random flurry of colours were seen bouncing and inquisting Rainbow Dash, trying to find out what had happened to the athlete in their own special ways. Unknowingly, their voices formed a symphony of bustling disharmony, a cacophony of rushing sounds that pushed and knocked against each other to make the gratuitous ringing that graced Rainbow Dash’s ears…

“Oh my, how did it go?”

“Are you alright, Rainbow Dash, you look positively gruesome…”

“Oh Rainbow Dash, are you alright?”

“Dashie, are you okay? Did they kick you?”

“Guldarn it, sugarcube, are you alright?”

Rainbow Dash hesitated. Then, she told them…

“No, no, no!” She yelled, eyes flaring with renewed anger. “No! This is unacceptable! I will not be having this giant gap in our precipitation quota in Eastern Ponyville!” The rainbow maned pony snapped at an unsuspecting passing pegasus. “You, where’s Cloudkicker?”

“I-I, um…I think she’s at the Town Hall.” The mare stuttered. “Officer Cloudkicker is supposed to be meeting with the Mayor today to discuss the state of rainfall in the past few months.”

“Well, tell her she can have her meeting and shove it up her a---! There’s an area that needs showering, and she needs to get there to oversee it, pronto. We can’t afford to lose out on a single opportunity to hit some rain in the East, especially not with extended drought they’ve been having!” She returned to bark at the young stallion standing opposite her desk. “You!”

“What, me?” He asked nervously.

“That’s right, you find the new guy, Pound Cake, was it, and get your sorry butts down to South and give them a twenty percent precipitation rate for the next hour. They’ve had enough rain in the past few days, they can survive a little while longer with less; you got all that?”

“Yes ma’am, I’ll be right on it.” He nodded dutifully. As the stallion turned to leave, however, he froze like he had been struck cold, and turned unnaturally to face his captain. He bore an awkward smile. “Ahem, Ma’am, where exactly is the designated—“

“Letter for Rainbow Dash! Letter for Rainbow Dash!” A flustered looking stallion came bursting through the doors of the weatherpony office. “It’s from the Wonderbolts’ Captai—“

“Complaints from the West!” A screechy voice announced loudly from amongst the hubbub. “Complaints from the west, the civilians there say they haven’t received their ration of water; will someone please send a pegasus to attend—”

“—supply, because I think I’ve forgotten…”

“Ah!” Rainbow Dash hollered, waving her hooves around sporadically, as if swatting off a nest of bees. She immediately turned to the mailpony, her teeth seething. “What is it? What message?”

“Miss Spitfire wants to talk to you. It’s regarding the proposal for recruitment into the Wonder—“

“Send it back. Tell her I’ll speak to her next time.” Rainbow Dash waved it off dismissively. She spun to yell back into the bustling crowd of pegasi. “Tell Golden Wind to take care of the West! I’ll go myself down to talk to them later—“

“But she says that this is the last time!” The mailpony insisted. “She says it’s either you accept or you’re never getting a place in the Wonderbolts. Ever.”

“No, don’t put that package there!” She waved frantically at a pink maned pegasus. “Move it there, over there! Ugh, Spitifre and her friggin’ gimmicks, tell her she’s gonna have to threaten me some other time, I’m waaay too busy now.”

“But she’s serious! She said that if that ‘blue, feather-brained excuse of a pigeon’ dosen’t sign the form by today, she’s going to veto you out!”

“Ugh, and I. Don’t. Friggin’. Care! And you!” She glared at the young stallion. “It’s Warehouse Five! The second smallest box! Stop standing there like you’re waiting for the world to end! Get moving!” After a quick nod and hasty retreat, Rainbow Dash returned her attention to the mailpony. “Well, what am I supposed to do about it? Just get up and leave this place to shrivel up?”

“Well…I’m not sure.” The mailpony looked uneasily down at his hooves. “But Miss Spitfire told me to ask you whether you really wanted to be stuck working some underpaid job in a dead-end town for the rest of your life, or if you could take the other way out, and live a life of glamour and fame with the whole of Equestria at your wingtips. It’s an opportunity, she said, not one that she easily gives out, and she’s really mad at you for taking so long to respond to it. She says that if you don’t accept it soon, she’s going to give the chance to someone else who actually cares, and you’ll be shut out forever.”

That stopped her. Rainbow Dash simmered down, and she suddenly found her breaths growing progressively heavier. Closing her eyes, she tried to concentrate, but found that she could no longer hear her own thoughts through the eternal racket of the weather office.  Panicking, she tried thinking of something, anything, clinging onto the first things that crossed her mind, and the images conjured, ripe and real in the flesh, made her decision for her. With an expression sullenly hardened steel, she told the mailpony…

“…And I’m sure, Rainbow Dash, positive, in fact, that I don’t need help!”

The hollowness of a long abandoned pathway was suddenly filled with the screeching and cranking of a rusted wheel, as the blue pony, standing on her hindquarters, was pushing another unicorn on a wheelchair along its hardened dirt. The blue pony seemed hardly enthused, keeping vigil as she applied the necessary amount of pressure and force to keep the old wheelchair going. This was in stark contrast with the other; the unicorn who was sitting still-legged, but waving her front hooves dramatically and nattering on in a ringing, accented voice.

“And really Rainbow Dash, I would have thought that you had other things to do; don’t you have any work at the weather station to do?”

At this, Rainbow Dash found reason to break her cyclonic rigidness. She simply shook her head slowly, and continued wheeling the unicorn down the path.

“Really, Rainbow, I would hardly dare believe that; aren’t they facing something of a management crisis now?”

Rainbow Dash did not reply to that. She simply pushed the wheelchair on, passing a young tree; its leaves flying dryly into the chilling winds.

“I mean, I would never blame you for leaving to do your job, especially for a mess that I’ve gotten myself into anyway.”

Rainbow Dash said nothing. She went past a greyed building, the spaces between its bricks filled with moss.

“Goodness knows you never did a lot of that when you were young.”

This attempt at humour was somewhat punctuated by a gust of cold wind and the cranking sound as the wheels rolled over a piece of debris. Rainbow Dash gave an awkward smile, and then continued on her way through the stasis of a decaying world. There was silence for a long time.

When conversation started up again, it was the unicorn who instigated it; the rainbow pony was still unwordly.

“So, how was that offer from the sports association? Did you take it up?”

After a moment of quiet, the unicorn thought that she might have been unclear, so modified her statement.

“Did you accept it?”

Rainbow Dash made no movement to acknowledge this. The ground was getting rougher now, and the wheelchair would give an occasional hiccup or bounce as it travelled over its surface.

“By Celestia, you don’t mean you rejected them! But why, whatever for?”

Rainbow Dash continued rolling.

“Don’t tell me it’s to take care of me! By Luna’s grace, you’re such a sweetheart, but you musn’t let such an opportunity go just like that! Oh, I know how much you’ve been looking forward to this, especially after what happened last time!”

The wheels creaked to a stop. They had arrived at their destination. Unwaveringly, Rainbow Dash pushed her way up a ramp and into the building; the shabbily worn structure of a cathedral shaped boutique.

“Really, I’m fine, I can take care of myself.”

The wheelchair rolled into the darkened confines of an empty room, little shards of light revealing mannequins and fabrics piled around the place. As Rainbow Dash pushed the unicorn in, she found that the wheels moved smoothly across the floor, a sentiment of being well-polished even after months of disuse.

At this, Rainbow Dash finally turned to look at the unicorn, her eyes shadowed under a dulling mane. Suddenly, under this acquisition, the unicorn could feel butterflies dancing in her stomach, and sweat forming on her hooves. Inwardly, she gulped, and proceeded sharply.

“Well, you cannot give up this chance! I forbid you! I know how much you’ve been looking hoping; dreaming about, this, and I absolutely cannot allow you to give it up just for a weak unicorn’s sake! A-after all, it was I who was not looking out properly, w-when it happened. I-I should be the one responsible for it, and I can take care of myself. You should just l-leave me a-alone, and I’ll be able to h-handle everything, I’ll b-be able to manage it.”

Even then, she did not sound strong, and one could quite clearly hear the tremor in her voice as she strung off weakly. Tilting her head down, Rainbow Dash turned to leave, the chime of a bell gracing her ears with haunting familiarity; when there was a pitiful sound behind her, and she looked back to see the unicorn stretching her hoof out.

“Please don’t give up this chance. It’s been your lifelong dream, ambition. Please don’t let this drag you down.”

Once again, Rainbow Dash felt a flicker of doubt, curdling in her heart like it had so many times so many years ago. But this doubt was tempered with something different then, a sort of tired understanding that circled enveloped the world and became it, a constant exchange of soul and spirit that morphed and formed, after so long, to became one and the same.

“No, Rarity.” Was all she said. With the short ring of a bell and the clicking shut of a door, she was gone.

…and came spiraling down onto the grass, facing the yellow pegasus.

“Eep!” Fluttershy hid her face behind a pair of trembling hooves. When it had become clear that she had not been ambushed, she peeked daringly through a small gap. Spotting Rainbow Dash’s face, she relaxed, getting up from her position on the ground. “Oh goodness, Rainbow Dash, I thought you were something else. What are you doing here?”

“I…” The rainbow-maned pony hesitated. She sighed. “I’m sorry for calling you weak just now, and saying that you couldn’t take care of your animals.  You’re not weak, and you can take care of your animals just fine, if only a giant featherbrain like me could have realized that.”

Fluttershy shook her head, smiling gently. “No, it’s alright. I do act rather helpless at times, and my animals can sometimes get the better of me, even on the best of days. But the thing that keeps me going is knowing that I make a difference to these animals at the end of the day, that they are healthy, loved, and well taken care of. I don’t need anything else to help me through these days, because that’s all the motivation I need.”

“No, but I’m still an idiot. I shouldn’t have called you those things; I was just annoyed, and I shouted with without thinking. You’re my friend, and I didn’t treat you like on, which makes me the one at fault. Ugh, stupid, stupid, stupid…”

“It’s quite alright.” Fluttershy reassured. “It’s not the first time I’ve been made fun of, and you came to apologise to me. Well, I won’t disturb your flying practice anymore; I’ll be getting back to my cottage…”

“No, wait.” Rainbow Dash reached a hoof out nervously. “Um, I…I might be able to take some time off my flying to…help you with your animals.”

“Really?” Fluttershy’s eyes brightened instantly. “Why, Rainbow Dash, that’s great! Oh, thank you; I really hope that I’m not disturbing anything.”

“Nothing’s more important that helping a friend.” She said affirmatively. Realising the mushiness of the statement she had just made, Rainbow Dash dragged an embarrassed hoof down her face. “Ugh, why did I just say that?”

Fluttershy gave an airy chuckle. “It’s okay, Rainbow Dash, I understand…”

…

…

…

The blue pony lay on the cloud, her wings outstretched, watching the cumulus of the setting sun pass her by.

She stared, stared, stared; stared until her eyes grew wide and swollen from the extensive stillness, then gave a soft exhale. She reached out her hoof, letting it hang, suspended, in the air, as if she was touching the clouds, as if she could feel their fluffy wetness, like smoke, brushing and willowing around her exposed skin, drifting steadily away like a large vessel in an expansive sea with no destination. Quietly, she lay like that, for five minutes, ten minutes, maybe more, until her hoof grew numb with the prickling cold. She retracted it, exhaling again.

“Feeling lonely today?”

The pegasus’ eyes flew open. She turned downwards, to see a lavender alicorn smiling softly back. She was surrounded by the remnants of dying leaves, black and brown patches of overgrown grass that drooped wearily onto the cracked ground.

“Heh, you would know the answer to that.”

The alicorn did not reply, only maintaining her quiet smile. Then, she looked down, casting a small spell on a decaying plant, the traces of her magic only beginning to form faintly around its limp body.

“So many years,” She said. “And you’re still here waiting. Tell, what has kept you alive, what has kept you waiting?”

“Guess I outlived them. They needed me, so I stayed on.”

The alicorn made a soft sound of amusement. “You always seemed to be more of the immortal one.”

The plant was reforming. Slowly, the colour of its leaves returned to a dull brown, and the swirling of the magic became stronger and more accentuated.

The pegasus shifted uncomfortably on her cloud. “What I don’t understand, though, is why. Why did they have to go?”

“All things have to go. Surely you know that?” The alicorn muttered, focusing on the plant, which had turned a sickly yellow and whose leaves were slowly lifting off the ground.

“Yes, but why did it have to be this way? Why couldn’t they stay forever?”

The magic was becoming increasingly strong now, spiraling in incredible swirls around the gradually reviving plant. The faintest hint of green was entering its edges, like a slowly spreading virus. The lavender alicorn stared darkly at the pegasus. “Do you mean to challenge the natural process? I can assure you nothing good ever comes from that.”'

“No, it’s just…to do all this, and for what?  To watch them fade away, lost and forgotten among the annals of time? To watch them stumble and disappear, like last place members in a race? It’s just…sick, that’s what it is, and for once I don’t want to do anything to do with it.”

“Hm, it seems like you have sacrificed much.” A bead of sweat rolled down the alicorn’s temple. The streams of black and purple light now flew chaotically around the plant, shaking it tremendously, its leaves being flung back and forth like it was being blustered by a tornado. “Pray tell, why did you do all that?”

“I don’t know.” The pegasus lay back onto the cloud, once again faced with the enormity of a neverending sky. “I guess I wanted to prove something. That I could stay with my friends forever. That I could keep them safe and still be happy. ”

“Hm, in that case, wouldn’t that make it something of a victory as well?” Her mane leaped into the air. The plant shone with rejuvenated life.

Rainbow Dash sighed. “Then I guess sometimes the empty wins are the most important ones.”

Kzzt! A crackle, and the waves of magic dissipated from around the stalk of botany. The plant fell to the ground, its entirety as black as if it had never been modified. The alicorn looked up, and saw the tired face of a blue pegasus reflected in her gaze. She levitated a pile of dirt and washed it over the deceased plant, respectfully burying her failed experiment from view.

“I never thought I’d be here, without a word to my name or a bit to my honour…yet here I am.”

“So where do plan to go next?” The mutter seemed more for the ground than the pegasus.

“I wouldn’t know. So much is gone yet nothing remembered; I really wouldn’t know where to go from here.” The pegasus contemplated this for a while, and the alicorn waited patiently. Finally, she gave an answer. “Away. Away, and to some further place.”

The alicorn tipped her head. “Then, I shall look forward to meeting you there when we should inevitably cross paths again…Rainbow Dash.”

“Back at ya, Twilight.”

A moment of eyes met, and then the two ponies bid goodbye and parted ways. The blue pegasus shot out into the mountains, zig-zagging through its craggy peaks. She flew straight through the clouds and towards the sun, the light reflecting off her last moulting feathers.